Ballmer: Japan Win7 sales ‘fantastic’; U.S. launch outpaces Vista

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, in Tokyo on Thursday, said that Windows 7 sales in Japan are “fantastic” and that the company’s Japan subsidiary is its best performing.

He didn’t provide any numbers, but said quicker start-up times were attracting customers in Microsoft’s second-largest market, according to The Associated Press. He told reporters new computers also were boosting sales.

“People don’t buy operating systems, they buy computers with operating systems on them,” Ballmer said, as reported by the AP.

Because of discounts, pre-sales and fewer promotions, Windows 7 dollar sales were 82 percent higher than those for Vista from Oct. 18 to 24. Windows 7 officially launched Oct. 22, so NPD’s figures include pre-sales.

Courtesy of Microsoft

However, PC sales for that first week didn’t surge as much for Windows 7 as they did for Vista, according to NPD. In the week Vista launched, PC sales grew 170 percent over the week before; for Windows 7, that figure was 95 percent, NPD said.

“A combination of factors impacted Windows 7 PC sales at the outset, but the trajectory of overall PC sales is very strong leading into the holiday season,” Stephen Baker, NPD’s vice president of industry analysis, said in a statement. “Vista had a slight advantage at launch, as January traditionally has a bigger sales footprint than October.

“The other hurdle Windows 7 faced was sales of PCs with older operating systems (XP and Vista) were high, making up 20 percent of sales during the Windows 7 launch, compared to just 6 percent of older operating sales during Vista’s launch week.”